The field of the present disclosure relates to optical surface gratings. In particular, surface gratings designed by computed interference between simulated optical signals and fabricated using photoreduction lithography or photoreduction lithography followed by replication, and optical devices or instruments incorporating such gratings, are disclosed herein.
One or more distributed optical structures (i.e., sets of diffractive elements) on a surficial interface may be used to angularly disperse light as a function of frequency and to also provide signal wavefront transformations. Distributed optical structures designed by computed interference between simulated optical signals are disclosed herein that may enable substantially optimized performance of such devices. Also disclosed are reduction lithographic fabrication means that allow for designed distributed optical structures to be rendered on a mask on a size scale consistent with economical and flexible spatially coherent writing means and yet fabricated on the smaller size scales necessary to support desired optical functionality.
Various embodiments, implementations, and adaptations of optical waveguides with diffractive element sets are disclosed in:                application Ser. No. 11/361,407 filed Feb. 23, 2006 in the name of Thomas W. Mossberg (now U.S. Pat. No. 7,116,453 issued Oct. 3, 2006);        application Ser. No. 11/334,039 filed Jan. 17, 2006 in the names of Thomas W. Mossberg, Christoph M. Greiner, and Dmitri Iazikov;        application Ser. No. 11/298,290 filed Dec. 9, 2005 in the names of Thomas W. Mossberg, Dmitri Iazikov, and Christoph M. Greiner (now U.S. Pat. No. 7,330,614 issued Feb. 12, 2008);        application Ser. No. 11/280,876 filed Nov. 15, 2005 in the names of Christoph M. Greiner, Dmitri Iazikov, and Thomas W. Mossberg;        application Ser. No. 11/239,540 filed Sep. 28, 2005 in the name of Thomas W. Mossberg (now U.S. Pat. No. 7,009,743 issued Mar. 7, 2006);        application Ser. No. 11/213,345 filed Aug. 25, 2005 in the names of Christoph M. Greiner, Dmitri Iazikov, and Thomas W. Mossberg (now U.S. Pat. No. 7,120,334 issued Oct. 10, 2006);        application Ser. No. 11/210,439 filed Aug. 23, 2005 in the names of Dmitri Iazikov, Christoph M. Greiner, and Thomas W. Mossberg (now U.S. Pat. No. 7,359,597 issued Apr. 15, 2008);        application Ser. No. 11/155,327 filed Jun. 16, 2005 in the names of Christoph M. Greiner, Thomas W. Mossberg, and Dmitri Iazikov (now U.S. Pat. No. 7,190,858 issued Mar. 13, 2007);        application Ser. No. 11/076,251 filed Mar. 8, 2005 in the name of Thomas W. Mossberg (now U.S. Pat. No. 7,062,128 issued Jun. 13, 2006);        application Ser. No. 11/062,109 filed Feb. 17, 2005 in the names of Christoph M. Greiner, Thomas W. Mossberg, and Dmitri Iazikov (now U.S. Pat. No. 7,181,103 issued Feb. 20, 2007);        application Ser. No. 11/055,559 filed Feb. 9, 2005 in the names of Christoph M. Greiner, Thomas W. Mossberg, and Dmitri Iazikov (now U.S. Pat. No. 7,123,794 issued Oct. 17, 2006);        application Ser. No. 11/021,549 filed Dec. 23, 2004 in the names of Dmitri Iazikov, Christoph M. Greiner, and Thomas W. Mossberg (now U.S. Pat. No. 7,260,290 issued Aug. 21, 2007);        application Ser. No. 10/998,185 filed Nov. 26, 2004 in the names of Dmitri Iazikov, Christoph M. Greiner, and Thomas W. Mossberg (now U.S. Pat. No. 6,993,223 issued Jan. 31, 2006);        application Ser. No. 10/989,244 filed Nov. 15, 2004 in the names of Christoph M. Greiner, Thomas W. Mossberg, and Dmitri Iazikov (now U.S. Pat. No. 6,961,491 issued Nov. 1, 2005);        application Ser. No. 10/989,236 filed Nov. 15, 2004 in the names of Christoph M. Greiner, Dmitri Iazikov, and Thomas W. Mossberg (now U.S. Pat. No. 6,965,716 issued Nov. 15, 2005);        application Ser. No. 10/923,455 filed Aug. 21, 2004 in the names of Thomas W. Mossberg, Dmitri Iazikov, and Christoph M. Greiner (now U.S. Pat. No. 7,054,517 issued May 30, 2006);        application Ser. No. 10/898,527 filed Jul. 22, 2004 in the named of Dmitri Iazikov, Christoph M. Greiner, and Thomas W. Mossberg (now U.S. Pat. No. 7,194,164 issued Mar. 20, 2007);        application Ser. No. 10/857,987 filed May 29, 2004 in the names of Lawrence D. Brice, Christoph M. Greiner, Thomas W. Mossberg, and Dmitri Iazikov (now U.S. Pat. No. 6,990,276 issued Jan. 24, 2006);        application Ser. No. 10/842,790 filed May 11, 2004 in the names of Thomas W. Mossberg, Christoph M. Greiner, and Dmitri Iazikov (now U.S. Pat. No. 6,987,911 issued Jan. 17, 2006);        application Ser. No. 10/798,089 filed Mar. 10, 2004 in the names of Christoph M. Greiner, Thomas W. Mossberg, and Dmitri Iazikov (now U.S. Pat. No. 6,823,115 issued Nov. 23, 2004);        application Ser. No. 10/794,634 filed Mar. 5, 2004 in the names of Dmitri Iazikov, Thomas W. Mossberg, and Christoph M. Greiner (now U.S. Pat. No. 6,985,656 issued Jan. 10, 2006);        application Ser. No. 10/740,194 filed Dec. 17, 2003 in the names of Dmitri Iazikov, Thomas W. Mossberg, and Christoph M. Greiner (now U.S. Pat. No. 7,224,855 issued May 29, 2007);        application Ser. No. 10/653,876 filed Sep. 2, 2003 in the names of Christoph M. Greiner, Dmitri Iazikov, and Thomas W. Mossberg (now U.S. Pat. No. 6,829,417 issued Dec. 7, 2004);        application Ser. No. 10/602,327 filed Jun. 23, 2003 in the name of Thomas W. Mossberg (now U.S. Pat. No. 6,859,318 issued Feb. 22, 2005);        application Ser. No. 10/229,444 filed Aug. 27, 2002 in the names of Thomas W. Mossberg and Christoph M. Greiner (now U.S. Pat. No. 6,678,429 issued Jan. 13, 2004);        application Ser. No. 09/843,597 filed Apr. 26, 2001 in the name of Thomas W. Mossberg (now U.S. Pat. No. 6,965,464 issued Nov. 15, 2005);        application Ser. No. 09/811,081 filed Mar. 16, 2001 in the name of Thomas W. Mossberg (now U.S. Pat. No. 6,879,441 issued Apr. 12, 2005).        
These references indicate the state of the art available for forming diffractive elements that can in turn be used to form diffractive elements according to the present disclosure. Many of these references describe diffractive elements formed in a one- or two-dimensional optical waveguide, wherein the input or output optical signal propagates in the waveguide. Some of these references describe diffractive elements forming surface gratings, wherein both input and output optical signals propagate as diffraction-guided optical beams. For one or more of the references listed hereinabove, it may be the case that the devices, structures, embodiments, implementations, adaptations, procedures, or techniques disclosed therein may be employed, within the scope of the present disclosure or appended claims, for implementing an optical surface grating, a method for fabricating the optical surface grating, or an optical spectrometer incorporating the optical surface grating.